craftaholics anonymous:::how i pinned it and did it:::silhouette necklace

or...this post could easily be called, "the day i cried over spilled milk a necklace."

but first things first.
good morning, lovelies!
how was your memorial day weekend?
our was.....well, a little sketchy at first.
let's just say that even though i'm a grown-up, i act like a child sometimes when i don't get my way, and things are less than fun around here. :/  boo to me.
thankfully, i have an amazing husband, who loves the Lord, and God intervened and rescued the day.
yay!
i woke up to...

army men on the kitchen floor:::beautiful skies:::i dug out my flags for decor:::and we went for a run at the track as a family

{also in there was a grad party and a cookout at my besties, but i kept my camera phone away for fear of being called a 'paparazzi'.  AHEM...sophie!  :D  love you, girl!}

now onto the REAL reason that i have you all here today.


i'm not even going to ask for a raise of hands and ask who likes to craft.
i'm pretty sure that all of you have an inner love and desire to create.
to make something beautiful.
to have the satisfaction of a job well done.
for a project to turn out.
i happen to love to craft and create, but hadn't really done a whole lot of it for the past few years because of
general busyness and raising my kiddos.
i tend to get off in my own little world when i create, and with four kiddos always being hungry or needing something, i just set aside my craftiness for a while.
well, it turns out that the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, and my girlies love to craft like their mama.
with pinterest at your fingertips and beautiful things swirling around the whole DIY world, what's us girls to do?
MAKE SOMETHING!
or several somethings.
honestly, my girls are a huge drive to our creations.
they have the fair coming up, and they also sell their seasonal creations at a local shop in a nearby town.

anywho, this leads me to this pin that had my heart all a flutter.
i mean, like, i really, really loved this necklace, but seeing as it would cost over $200 for my four kiddos, it was out.of.the.question.
i started perusing the internet for options and found this tutorial.
thus began my adventure in silhouette making.
and my love hate relationship with ICE RESIN.

how i made a silhouette necklace

first, i took pictures with my camera phone of my children's profiles in front of a sunny window.

then, i edited them in picmonkey{HELLO! new collages!}.
i simply adjusted the contrast and exposure to make them as dark as i could without losing detail.
then i pasted them all in a word document and made them all the same size.  i am old school here, folks.
i printed them off and then glued the images to a piece of black construction paper and cut them out carefully.
VOILA!
i had my template. 
all i had to do what to shrink them down to the pendant size.

once i had them printed the correct size{see left  pic above}, i used the template from the bezels that i bought from hobby lobby to cut them the correct shape of the bezel{pendant}.
this gets tricky because you need to cut your picture as neatly as possible smaller than the actual size of the bezel, BECAUSE, the picture has to be taped with clear tape and sealed so that the resin doesn't sink into the paper.  i realized at this point that i cut like a kindergartener.  not for the faint of heart, i tell ya.
the nester does a much better job at this tutorial, so go there and watch the video she has posted, too.

fyi.
the above ad is a lie.  they claim you can 'make one ounce of resin withOUT measuring, just push and stir???'
i beg to differ, peeps, but maybe i'm just plain 'ol crazy.
moving on...

if you are wondering why the one pendant of my eldest looks different, it's because while i was at michaels, i spotted this, and really liked it.
it sure made it easier to do elly's.  no gluing, or resining, and i like the 'collected' non-matchy look of the pendants all together.

so while the above picture looks grand, after i poured the resin and painstakingly waited the three days for it to dry.
it didn't.  they were a sticky, non hardened mess.
:/
not sure what happened there, but it must have been the fact that the resin doesn't always come out in equal parts{hence my accusation above}.
OR...maybe i didn't stir it enough, although i followed the instructions perfectly.
needless to say, i cried.
like a big 'ol baby, i was so disappointed that they didn't turn out, so i put them away and vowed to never even look in the direction of the resin again.

but first,  i gouged them out like a real grown up would do.

on memorial day, nathan offered to help give the resin a go one.more.time.
i hesitantly agreed, and re-cut all the pictures, taped them all back up, and lovingly eased them into their bezels...again.
he carefully mixed the remaining resin and poured it into the bezels.
i was covering my eyes and praying the whole time.  :)

after we he poured, he poked out any air bubbles and covered them with a glass bowl so nothing would settle in the wet resin{live and learn}.
six hours later, they had begun to harden.
and today, the third day{needed for curing}, they are beauuuutiful and they look even better than the first ones that i did.

and THAT is how i we made a silhouette necklace.  and cried about it.

if you want to make one of these, but you are too scared to try the resin, you can also purchase these.
the glass cabochons fit the bezels perfectly, and look very nice.
the glass magnifies the image a little and all you need is the bezel, the cabochon, and glue! :)

the end.

oh!  and because i had the silhouettes on hand, i framed them{home goods...GO!} for my bedroom that is in the process of being 'freshened up'. 
i am SO happy to have these done.
it is so very special to me to have my children captured like this at this very moment of our lives.

i'm linking up with alicia, and her happy day project of pinned it and did it.
we didn't know it at first, but we were both doing this at the same time.  #GreatMindsThinkAlike
she made a simply amazing necklace, and hers turned out on the first try.  #Jealous
blessings to you all!
i'm on laundry lock down for the rest of the day.

:::this verse blessed me last night at church:::

"My goodness, and my fortress; my high tower, and my deliverer; my shield, and [he] in whom I trust; who subdueth my people under me."

Psalm 144:2

xo,
mary